


The Short Stories

by Elizabeth Klarke (cyanideparty)



Series: Adolf & Eva Collection [5]
Category: Adolf Hitler - Fandom, Historical Criminals RPF, Historical RPF, Real Person Fiction, Third Reich - Fandom, World War 2 - Fandom
Genre: Adolf Hitler - Freeform, Eva Braun - Freeform, Eva Hitler, F/M, Historical, Inspired by Real Events, Love, Nazi Germany, Romance, Third Reich, Tragic Romance, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2019-04-30 19:07:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 12,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14503560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyanideparty/pseuds/Elizabeth%20Klarke
Summary: A collection of short one shots about the relationship between Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun.





	1. Entropy [T]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life in love and in war.

**I.**

War has the potential to be boring from the driver’s seat. Too often stressful. Too often tiring. But sometimes very boring. There are always men walking around and that becomes a boring sight rather quickly.

So he thinks about her. He tries not to. Not too much. He is committed to keeping his two worlds separate. War is very dark and very dirty, and he doesn’t want her mixed in with all that. With all the bullets and the blood and the bodies. All the ashes of the necessary dead.

After all, she isn’t a mission. She is a want. A desire. Not an imperative end-goal. But one he’s going to take on personally just the same. He wants to; because he wants her.

And he doesn’t want her mixed in with those hard, necessary means to their necessary end.

She requires far softer means. She is a want, after all.

 

**II.**

She’s perfected the routine of innocence and purity. An attractive contrast to the filth that comes with cleansing a society. She’s already clean and he likes that immensely.

He likes it when things can be clean.

But that isn’t always the case in his line of work, where the only thing flesh is good for is splitting open, weeping, and then rotting. So she’s a nice change of pace.

 

**III.**

She’s easier than war. When he goes to her, she’s ready and she’s willing to be conquered. He doesn't need soldiers to bend her to his vision. She's already on her back, body open and waiting, prepared to accept his objective. 

Turns out, there’s a strange and curious pleasure hiding behind the act of capitulation.

And in what was once an unforeseen, accidental discovery, she proves to him time and again how submission can be such a lovely indulgence for his own body. Sometimes he likes having his power stripped away and his mythology erased. Sometimes he likes having to cast his eyes up.

Sometimes, this change of pace feels very good.

 

**IV.**

There are many evenings spent next to her on the couch. She whispers in his ear, occasionally saying his name very softly; and his chest becomes warm and heavy and that makes him want to smile. Her shoulder is slightly, subtly pressing into his. And late into the night he grabs her hand and tucks their tangled fingers down in between their bodies, out of sight. Sometimes the moment is only for the two of them.

The feeling of being human again is now a dreamy treasure.

 

**V.**

Worry is in her voice, and there’s an uncomfortable tightness in her embrace when they must once again part ways. They’ve been there since September of ‘39. And they’ve only gotten worse.

He knows she dislikes the sight of him in the uniform. She perceives it to be him playing chicken with fate. Boldly broadcasting a death sentence.

And he doesn’t know how to cure her of that doomsday fantasy. He doesn’t know how to stop the nightmares of funerals and the images of tombs scored with his name and a pair of dates. And this bothers him.

He doesn’t like the feeling of being unfit.

 

**VI.**

His health has become one of her obsessions. A hobby, almost. But without the relaxation or satisfaction owed of a recreation. She’s always asking asking asking, always asking everyone. Everyone else, at least--she doesn’t trust his doctor and she makes that very clear.

At its foundation, it’s a very thoughtful gesture. He knows she’s so persistent because she’s in love; and love is such a powerful thing, he knows that too. But sometimes the hypocrisy gets stuck under his skin. He’s smelt cigarette smoke on her clothing more than once and she never eats.

For some reason, the mirrors in the house all lie to her. He tells her it’s not all the other men he’s afraid of. No, he’s afraid of the call that reveals she’s been stolen away from him by the Föhn, of all things. But she smirks and dismissively waves her hand. And ignores the truth behind it.

She’s left him with his own obsession, his own hobby. He’s always asking asking asking, asking about the little things because maybe not every little thing turns into a big thing but every big thing certainly starts out as a little thing and he’s not willing to roll any dice here.

He needs to know she is strong. He needs to know she cannot and will not break. He needs to know she will be here. Work hasn’t been going as planned lately.

 

**VII.**

He knows she wants to ask him about the setbacks.

But she doesn’t. She instead shows him her new pair of black shoes with ridiculously steep heels on them. And for a brief moment, he’s worrying about her breaking an ankle rather than the setbacks.

 

**VIII.**

Truth be told, he often prefers to give consideration to the easy, trivial quandaries of her life rather than occupy himself with the momentous ones of his own. The solutions are often very simple. Obvious. Attainable. He can pluck them right out of the air and drop them into her grateful little hands.

At that moment, she will be happy. And he will be happy. Because something he has done has made someone happy.

 

**IX.**

She’s upset he won’t come home during the winter. And it’s certainly justified. He’s just as upset about it all as she is. But he refuses to talk about it. He's too busy pushing their oasis farther and farther away from here, keeping it safe, keeping it sterile, keeping it shiny and spotless.

And that comes with a price. They rarely feel one another. They rarely see one another. Photographs don’t do her justice, they never have, and he knows his words can only pad the emptiness within her so much. He knows because the emptiness within himself is playing by the same rules. Bringing with it a dull, stubborn ache that pulls at him throughout the day, making sure he does not forget about this growing desire to be somewhere else, with someone else.

So yes, he thinks about her. Too much. He doesn’t even try to stop it. If she cannot be with him in body, then he will take her in spirit. He will stuff that emptiness full with dreams and memories and fantasies. He will stuff it full with the sound of her voice and the shape of her words. He will stuff it full with golden visions of the future.

He will find a way to stuff a black hole full.

 

**X.**

His eyes are shaded with the harsh colors of death and destruction. Of creeping, corroding failure. But she never tries to look away when they make love. She is committed, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, and she wants him to be certain of that. Her demise is in his hands and that’s both a comforting and a concerning thought.

 

**XI.**

It’s a hard realization. But one that must be acknowledged and respected. He sits her down in her room one evening and with a tight throat and a tongue made of cotton tells her he has no right to keep her, and that they must stop pretending otherwise. It’s past time he let her go and let her move on. She’s wasting her life here. Waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

And for what? The man who used to come home to her no longer exists. What she’s waiting for is a ghost.

So she tells him his teasing has gone too far, he’s just being mean now, he’s just hurting her now. She refuses to look at him. He takes ahold of her chin to force her stare. She whispers and whimpers _Stop it, stop it, stop it_ as he proceeds to bury her dream, when he says to her _You know I’m right._

He pushes on until he makes her cry. Until she rips her hands from his hold. Until she finally slaps him across the face in an act of self-preservation. An act that hurts her far more than it does him.

But there is no victory here. No pride. No relief. He is the villain if he breaks her heart. He is the villain if he steals her life. And when she’s lying before him, broken and limp like a corpse, that life leaving her anyway by way of frighteningly wretched sounds, he’s no longer sure which one is the lesser evil. He no longer knows which one he wants to be--or if it’s even possible to keep her alive anymore.

Perhaps she was doomed the day he chose her.

But that isn’t his fault, it can’t be. How could he have known? How could he have foreseen the treason and betrayal that is hell bent on drowning him? How could he have known that a life’s mission would demand the complete _entirety_ of his life, instead of just most of it?

How could he have known he had no life left to offer?

 

**XII.**

Everything is crumbling. Everything is breaking. The stage he’s built for himself is collapsing into a dilapidated mess. The nest he’s built for the two of them is being threatened. War has been bleeding into the gilded world in which they love together--and it’s had enough. It’s begun retaliating. Worming its way through the widening cracks of his barrier and into what was once supposed to be a one-and-done operation.

But this will not be endgame. He will simply work a little harder. He will simply will a little firmer. Then it will all fix itself. Things will be alright. He will sacrifice just a little bit more. He must sacrifice just a little bit more....

She’ll understand in the end.


	2. Stalemate [M]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was war, requiring precision steps. (Rated: M)

This was war. Requiring precision steps. Timing couldn’t be botched or slightly off the mark.

_Counter with right step after the predictable twirl to the left._

Diplomacy couldn’t fix the tension, or release the building pressure. The answer was hard physical combat. Body on body. Amid fire and smoke, sweat and blood, and the rattling and shaking of such intense engagement.

Tingled fingertips. Buoyed stride. It terrified and exhilarated to the nucleus. Intoxicated. A chemical reaction down to the smallest molecule. Within the smallest atom of everything. Everything a hundred and twenty miles an hour. Bursting. Exploding. Messy. Like fireworks carving thin shimmering streams into the soil of the witching hour.

And the confidence, _oh the endless, endless, endless confidence._ Not that he had any problem with it outside of this warzone. But it was very different in here, among the decorated walls. A soft, spritely scent of spicy flower petals, and fine white powder. Crystal handles on the drawers that flickered in any light. Fibers that embraced him, draped and cloaked him with sanctuary. He didn’t have to explain, did he? No. It was self-explanatory.

And very different.

Besides, he had absolutely no desire to walk into his bedroom some night and find one of his generals in his bed without a stitch of clothing. And sure, there was a country full of women who would gratefully drop to their knees before him, ready to service, ready to please. But that’s all they could be: _grateful_. Great for the ego boost. Not so great for everything else.

No one could look at him the way she did. In war. In love. Because no one knew him the way she did.

–    –    –

This was war. Requiring precision steps. Absolute accuracy of all strikes in all locations.

_Counter with immediate strike to the south after suffering unexpected strike in the north-east._

A scene of war unfolds chaotically, lawlessly. A body thrown to a flowered, feathered battlefield. Attacker follows, sheen and force of confidence. The enemy is immobilized: hands to wrists, fingers wrap around tight; hips on hips, sternum on sternum. The enemy is silenced: mouth to mouth, room enough for hard gasps but no words. The enemy is invaded and annexed: panties torn away, trousers undone, and fuck away the lines between whose spit and sweat and carnal fluids are whose.

But on this stage, odds of retaliation are a hundred percent. The air hot, heavy and hazy; the smell of intimacy clinging to the moisture splashed across his skin; and navigating through misted, love-stained eyes, he was easy to take down. He was easy to press into the mattress, hips easy to strangle beneath hers. He was easy to kiss, easy to mark, easy to bite with her palms pressing her weight into his shoulders. He was easy to ride, easy to push and pull with, her genitals sliding snugly against his. It was easy for her to lift a woozy sigh of surrender out of him and let it collapse from his kiss-swollen lips, no matter how sober his blood.

Fallen. Captured. No longer the hunter. Fixed beneath rapacious blue eyes dressed in a lust he wasn’t going to run away from

He normally didn’t hold a taste for capitulation. But he was among the decorated walls and perfumed air. Sometimes the differences were quite _interesting_. Tastes were oddly slippery, fluctuating and shifting on a whim. There were less rules here. Few strings to keep the arrow on the gauge in one place.

But everything a hundred and twenty miles an hour.

It’s how she made his insides feel so messy. Everytime. And it never failed to unnerve him. Exhilarating, sure, but terrifying nonetheless. He’d become hot and squishy between the ribs, and that was strange. Wrong. Out of place. She made his temperature rise and that couldn’t be a good sign in any capacity. Could it?

The way they marked one another up like two inexperienced horny teenagers when they made love was concerning too. He was too old for this kind of behavior. He was too old to be hiding hickeys on his neck and bite marks on his shoulders and nail tracks on his back. He was too old to be worrying during his morning shave that she refrain from swimming that day because dammit he’d just gotten _too excited_ with her the night before. He tried not to do that during the summer months when it wasn’t as convenient to cover up those sorts of things but sometimes, well he just didn’t care about self-control.

Sometimes he just didn’t care he was supposed to be too old for this kind of behavior.

Then he’d see her in her filmy lingerie, nipples looking as soft and savory as the tips of strawberries through the flimsy, transparent silk. All right. _Most_ of the time he didn’t care he was supposed to be too old.

–    –    –

This was war. Requiring precision steps. Requiring precision words. Diplomacy couldn’t fix the tension, but it could still be utilized.

_Counter with ******** ***** ***** *** after *** ******* ***** ****** ** *****._

Wild words of sentiment and sex and salacity slipped through the darkness like desperate paper airplanes. Thrown by desperate pilots. Hopeful they’d finally reach secure destinations, and never be sent back or destroyed again.

She’d taught him to make so many. Maybe too many. He was standing knee-deep in a sea of her planes. Planes crafted entirely from her words. And if he looked over to where she stood, he could see her standing in her own sea of planes. Crafted entirely from his words. It kept rising. And rising. And rising.

At the outset, it had been, _don’t let her in too much._ But then the world felt a little too lonely. Too lonely than his situation should be granting him. He kept looking to his side and he kept seeing her standing there, her presence always fuller than it was in that last glance. But she couldn’t say anything. She was mute. Tape across the lips. All she could do was stare up at him with the bright fairy eyes of a young girl trapped in the fetters of love.

Yes. He’d done that. Set tight his chains around her wrists and ankles. On purpose or not, he wasn’t sure. But he liked it, her captivity of commitment to him, that he knew. So perhaps he’d loosen that tape over her mouth and exchange some honest words with her. Honest whispers.

Just a little.

Then a little more.

Then a _little more._

Then… then he’d seen he now carried his own set of chains. A slightly different set, to be sure; but they were definitely there, and impossible to ignore. Part of him wanted to get angry. She’d slipped them on when he wasn’t looking, a terrible abuse against his rules. But more of him simply didn’t care because _he liked her too much._ He liked having someone he could talk to. Someone he could have hot _and_ lazy sex with. Someone he could make fun of as they held hands. Someone he could passively fight over the blankets with through the thick fog of sleep and darkness. Someone he didn’t have to be entirely faultless around all the fucking time… someone he could say _I’m tired_ to and instead of seeing weakness she’d tell him he was working too hard.

He liked having _one_ person. He could do all these with the same girl.

He liked having someone he could trust. Who would never thrust a knife into his back.

It came with the territory. Marriage brought with it close quarters and that meant very few secrets. Fewer closets to hide skeletons. He had to choose wisely the ones he wanted to keep from her sight. Hygiene habits, upkeep rituals, and other various lifestyle quirks that came from years of living on his own (he knew it wasn’t “normal” to stay up until four in the morning but whatever), there wasn’t a whole lot left unseen. She’d seen much of it coming in. The transition had affected them in distinct ways and he’d been able to tell.

Living with a _girl._ It had been strange. She had so much stuff in her bathroom, and he didn’t think it necessary…. She did forty different things to her hair every morning and it astounded him. He cared quite a bit about his hair but this was something else entirely. And there were so many tools simply for sculpting her nails. Brushes, scissors, others that looked something like thin dull scalpels; all secured in their own case. Why so many? Oh, and all the colors… lipsticks, nail polishes, pale powders he saw her layering onto her eyelids. He’d once asked her to describe the feeling of mascara to him. She’d told him women also had to curl the lashes and had shown him _that_ horrifying contraption. He’d never felt so relieved to have a dick.

Close quarters and very few secrets. Few corners to duck around, few walls to hide behind. It came with the territory. She knew his baseline, and she knew it very well. She lived on it alongside him. Any deviation she noticed. It was harder for him to lie; it was harder for her to omit. She recognized when he was frustrated and didn’t want to be touched; he recognized when she was upset and needed to be touched. She could discern between the _I’m busy and cannot be bothered_ and the _I’m busy but wouldn’t mind being distracted_ moments. He knew when he was and wasn’t allowed to play with her hair; and most of the time, he did it anyway. He liked the distressed expression she always gave him. Like he’d just killed her dog.

Sometimes he’d ask her, was she really so confident _those_ shoes went with _that_ dress? Simply for the daggers she’d hurl at him. Because who was he to question her style expertise? He who wore no flair or glamour, was more concerned with his clothing feeling comfortable than it fitting “correctly,” and spent only five minutes on his hair.

They’d been together for a decade. He wasn’t worried.

They weren’t married, of course. Not correctly. Rings, papers, signatures, rice in the air. But God be damned if it didn’t feel like it. And if he looked now, he could see her standing in that sea of planes, planes crafted entirely from his words. A sea so close to reaching her knees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bet you’re happy to see all that colorful, fluffy, marshmallow-vomit writing again.


	3. Wedding Gifts [M]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What does one give to their new spouse when they only have 36 hours left together?

It suddenly hurt, very much, to gaze upon her. Any and every part of her. Especially her left hand, which he’d just adorned with a simple, shiny gold band that now wreathed her middle finger because it was simply too big to comfortably and reliably sit upon her ring finger. Where it traditionally belonged.

And that almost gave him the impulse to laugh.

_ Tradition _ .

They’d never come close to touching the word, much less embodying it. It hadn’t bothered him much in the beginning because he was committed to her, and a simple, little piece of paper wasn’t required to prove that. It wasn't required to prove anything. But over the last couple of years, he’d started to wish for and dream of acquiring some of that tradition almost as much as she had.

He added it to the list. To that ever growing list of things he’d never been able to give her, of things she’d had to sacrifice for him time and again. He was still the leader of this country and he hadn’t even been able to secure a ring that wasn’t going to ceaselessly threaten to slip from her finger if she wasn’t careful enough.

They would simply never stop piling on, would they?

Nevertheless, she seemed more than happy with the offered embellishment. He saw the way she continued to glance at it, and the way the fingers of her opposite hand were obsessed with the smooth texture of the hard metal. Like she was afraid she would forget it was there and feared a moment might escape where she wasn’t intensely and acutely aware of it. He’d finally given her what she’d always wanted and she wasn’t about to take it for granted. Not in the slightest. Not when the end was so close.

But her happiness even when presented with an ill-fitting ring had only barbed his pain even further. She was used to him coming up short.

But regardless of this searing ache that the sight of that ring now inspired, he couldn’t restrain himself from frequently glancing at it; and then focusing on it. Obsessively. Something else was being provoked. The burn within his chest was spreading, moving into other areas of his body. And it didn’t take long for him to realize that it carried inside of it the insatiable, uncontrollable, unstoppable hunger of a deranged forest fire.

For once, he looked to the clock. Hardly twenty minutes had expired since they’d all sat down to dine in  _ celebration _ . An absurdly dark joke on all fronts. But there was no point in waiting. All the games, the pretending, the masquerading, they had all already evaporated long ago. Time wasn’t a luxury they possessed anymore. Time promised them nothing. Not even itself.

She suddenly shifted her weight then, while he was distracted, and he felt her knee rest up against his beneath the table. And he started, his back straightening, eyes widening and his teeth snapping together as his thoughts were shocked into paralysis. As he forgot everything outside of this small point of contact.

Spontaneous combustion. One second he was fighting an unsettling heat building in his heart; then the next beat came and the fire stole its way into his veins, riding on his pulse, and everything was abruptly being consumed by a fierce need that hadn’t visited him in quite some time.

It was a move motivated solely by habit. She’d done it subconsciously. It was second-nature for the two of them to physically seek one another out when they were seated at the table, the touches often innocent enough, only very occasionally flirting with stepping over the line of decency. They no longer thought about it, it simply happened. Most of the time he couldn’t even recall the point at which he’d taken a hold of her hand, or when she’d crossed her ankle over the top of his or pressed the side of her calf up against him.

But the reaction sparked within his body now was alarming. It was inexplicably violent. His body had interpreted this touch as everything beyond innocent. She might as well have slipped her hand between his thighs, unbuttoned his trousers and slowly run her nails up the length of his cock. He was so stunned that he momentarily wasn’t sure she hadn’t done exactly that. The feeling had been far too intense to have only been internal. Surely.

That blistering ache was now rapidly concentrating itself just below his waist, pouring in with abandon. A fierce need that hadn’t visited him in quite some time, yes—but that certainly hadn’t degraded them to strangers. He still knew it as well as he’d ever known it. And his body more than welcomed the unexpected reunion.

He abruptly stood, and all eyes were on him then—including hers. Especially hers. Her eyes were always on him, they’d always been on him and only him. She’d only ever had eyes for him and while that often made more than enough sense, sometimes it felt so strange and inexplicable because in what way had he given  _ to  _ her more than he’d taken  _ from  _ her? The most he’d been able to give was his word.

And she’d somehow found enough value in that word to stay. An impressive act. He had chosen well when he had chosen her. She was the only person whose loyalty and love he had never, ever doubted. The only person who had ever made him feel safe. The only person who treasured his name and never his title.

For a moment, he didn’t know what to say. All his words were gone. He only stared down at the white table cloth in silence, noticing for the first time a thin scar in the fabric where someone had sewn up a small hole.

He had to get her away. He had to get her alone. But the plan hadn’t drawn itself up before his body had acted on impulse. He couldn’t literally drag her away from the table, as much as he suddenly wished he could. Old habits died so hard.

But then the resounding tick of the second hand on the clock creeping its way forward cut through the dense, expanding haze in his mind. Echoing in his ears louder than almost anything he’d ever heard before, even as a soldier sprinting through No Man’s Land. And he was forced back into that cage he was trapped in, waiting to be discovered and devoured alive by a pack of barbaric, bloodthirsty beasts.

He found her gaze, aberrantly gay but bewildered, and he could see that his expression was only perplexing her further. He gave no thought as to how he looked. He was focused only on the fact that that menacing, backstabbing hand on the clock was pushing them into the future and it would continue pushing them into the future no matter what actions he took.

Time promised them nothing. And he would thieve from it whatever he could without reluctance or regret.

“I appreciate all your company at such a late hour,” he said, speaking to the table while his eyes remained fixed on hers. “But my wife and I are going to retire now.”

He offered her his left hand, preserving their eye contact because he didn’t want to see the twin band that now adorned his own ring finger, and she took it without hesitation. He helped her rise from her chair, then intertwined his fingers with hers and impatiently dragged her along behind him to her bedroom.

Let them all assume what they would. He was going to steal this last, small piece of tradition while it was still within reach.

As soon as he pulled her across the threshold, he threw her back up against the door and slammed it shut with the same motion. A safe, isolating blanket of darkness was thrown over them as every curve and every line of his body forced itself flush against hers. His mouth took hers as she tried to catch her breath, and as she swept her hand out to find the light switch he caught her wrist and kept it pinned to the door.

He didn’t want to look at her. He couldn’t. The thought of never again taking in each dazzling perfection and every charming flaw her body had to offer him was heartbreaking. But even worse was the icy, hollowing realization that he was about to utterly destroy every single one of them. Willingly. As a final directive.

And he knew he couldn’t have both. There was hardly any beauty left in this world. Everything of value was dying, if it wasn’t already rotting deep in the ground. But she was alive and her beauty was alive and he was too bitterly aware that he was now at the ready to turn it to ashes. He would set aflame his most precious and treasured piece of art to ensure  _ no one else  _ could  _ ever _ enjoy it.

His ownership over her body would outlive him. He would leave nothing to this world for anyone to find. Nothing but that simple, little piece of paper. A pair of unmistakable, unassailable, utterly unimpeachable signatures. Her name would be etched into history under his own and his alone. That’s what she wanted and so that’s what he would give to her. His perfectly macabre wedding gift.

He would give to her one last time before he turned back to only taking and taking and taking from her. Taking what he wanted so tremendously that he felt all those strangling threads keeping him terminally bound to this bleak reality start to loosen and unwind and then fall away.

The only ones that survived were the ones tying him to her. Tightening. Wrenching him closer. Still not close enough. He wanted more. More of her, more of her threads. He wanted to be cocooned in them. Consumed by her predatory love for him.

He felt her mouth on his neck. Her tongue across his skin. Her teeth cutting his flesh. He felt her fingernails rake hard down his chest and he heard his own voice sharpened with hysteria pierce the darkness. He laid there compliant and submissive as she ripped him apart. As she made him bleed.

He was going to make her kill him first. Her perfectly macabre wedding gift.


	4. Just Another Morning [K]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just another morning between Der Führer and his Dame. (Rated: K)

“Hey,” she whispered and poked him on the nose. He didn’t respond. So she did it again. “Hey.” Poke.

No response. Again.

“I know you’re awake.”

“I wouldn’t be if some woman would quit poking me,” he mumbled heavily into his pillow.

“Some woman?”

“Sorry. _Irritating_ woman,” he said and turned away from her but his voice was light. He brought the duvet up over his head and she reached over and yanked it back down. He groaned and lazily turned back to her, his eyes laden with sleep. “I’m _ti_ red,” he whined. “Leave me alone.”

She smiled sweetly. “That’s your own fault. Don’t stay up so late and you won’t have this problem.” She got up onto her hands and knees and clumsily crawled on top of him, her body awkwardly jabbing and sticking him in all kinds of uncomfortable places.

He groaned again, maneuvering her knees so they weren’t digging into his ribs. “My dear, I am _not_ a jungle gym.”

“But in here you _are_ my jungle gym.”

“That sounds unpleasant.”

“I can show you that it’s really not,” she said and bit her bottom lip coyly, her chin tucked down. “If you’re thinking naughtily.”

“Hard to do that when you’re concerned with important things being injured.”

She gave him a look of mock offense, her jaw dropping comically. “I would never do such a thing to something I treasure so much.”

“You almost did a second ago,” he countered, glancing at her bare knees. He shifted beneath her. “Those things never bode well for a man when they get near.”

“Come on,” she whined, perfectly imitating his inflection from two minutes ago as she softly bounced on him. “Let’s have some good morning fun. It’ll wake you up, I promise.”

“Too early,” he stated simply, closing his eyes and moving to hold her hips still, her offer not enticing him in the slightest.

“It’s noon,” she said flatly; and he feigned sleep.

She reached over to her side of the bed and grabbed her pillow, plopping it down onto his face. “Oh, such sweet peace again,“ she heard his muffled–his _grateful_ –sigh come from beneath the cushion.

She made a disgruntled noise and quickly clambered off him and in turn off the bed. She heartily gripped the duvet and ripped it from the bed, gathering it up in her arms in a giant ball she had to peek around because it was taller than her.

He removed the pillow from his face and sat up, his hair forming an unnatural cowlick on one side, a fine dusting of short dark whiskers across his cheeks and jaw. “Your age is showing.”

“This would be the first time that has bothered you.”

“You know, my bed has perfectly good blankets; and they come without the nuisance that is _you_ in the morning.” Her brows scrunched together and he smirked because her face was usually at its cutest when he was toying with her. Her buttons were the ones he enjoyed pushing the most.

He tossed his legs over the side of the bed. “I think I’ll go to my own room, now,” he threatened; and she immediately darted to the door, her feet stumbling on the plush carpeting due to the mass of thick, fluffy fabric she was clinging to. He couldn’t help but laugh at the sight. “You look silly.”

She stared pointedly at his hair. “You look silly.”

“You look cold,” he said, referring to the thin pink silken gown she was adorned in that left her arms and calves exposed. Her face free of make up and her own hair unevenly poofed, he thought he might be able to give her what she wanted this morning.

“You also look cold.”

“So bring the blankets–and yourself–back to bed; or force me to seek warmth elsewhere.”

“You’ll have to take me on,” she said, hefting her mountain in a show of determination.

“The both of you? I’m not sure how well I’ll fare against so much cotton.”

“It’s not the cotton you should be worried about.” She pretended to bring her knee up into the air nonchalantly, like she was simply stretching her hamstring.

“That’s not playing fair.”

She smiled innocently from around the pile. “I learned from the very best, you know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While they may or may not have even known what a jungle gym was, I don’t care. Just accept it and let them be cute.


	5. The Other Side [T]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There was another side to his story the world didn’t know. (Rated: T)

There was another side to his story the world didn’t know. At least not yet. Though she wasn’t sure it ever would due to his obsession with secrecy, with keeping her hidden away so awfully deep within his personal closet. That was how she knew the world wasn’t aware of the entire story he was currently writing: because she was the one who revealed a whole other half to it. She made up a rather large portion regardless of how much a choice few around him wanted to pretend she didn’t.

She was still here, contributing so much. She was the one who chased away the tension they created within them; the only one who always, _always_ instantly made him smile when she appeared; and the one who at the same time would produce a different, unique sort of tension inside of him. One that caused him to bite at his clipped nails, pace nervously all over his study, the sound of which could easily be heard within the hallways and the floor below their rooms, and constantly, anxiously, with increasing frequency glance at the silent phone sitting on his desk as the sun in the window refused to slow its descent within the sky.

All this when she was running late from an appointment or simply wasn’t where he wanted her to be at that moment.

As much as Magda wished she could incite that kind of reaction within him, she never would be able to get under his skin in the way Eva knew _she_ already was. Did she know he didn’t pay much attention to her whereabouts? That she simply wasn’t a priority within his life, rather more of an attractive knickknack on a fireplace mantel he could glance at and admire every now and then?

God, she hoped she did.

He never spoke in explicit terms during their phone conversations while he was conducting business away from home. But it was what he didn’t say that was so much more important than what he did say . She had learned this over the course of their rather self-sacrificing relationship. She had the ability to hear everything behind his words, the extremely subtle inflections he often applied to his words within his conversations with her. To the outside listener, the eavesdropper, they wouldn’t intrigue that much interest, if any. And they certainly wouldn’t translate correctly.

But that was because he hadn’t literally, physically been inside any one of them on multiple–no several–no _copious_ beautiful occasions over the years. And this was where a large part of the unknown story lay. Behind the closed doors of his apartment where many of the beginning chapters to this section of the story were drafted; and behind the closed doors of his study that sequestered their suite from the rest of the world where the story was currently being perfected and chapters frequently crafted and added.

The content may have gotten less graphic over the years but it had evolved into something that would without a doubt surprise her parents if they were to ever take a peek. They had originally only ever thought he was capable of using her as a temporary five-dollar whore.

But here they were and things had moved far from where they had started. The sex wasn’t as repeated and yet she felt he was closer to her than he ever had been before. This wasn’t to say the sex hadn’t been and still wasn’t intense and euphoric and ethereal, it was only to say that the lack of it had created space for something else, something rare that had started to rapidly grow between the two of them, pulling and stitching them together. Something based solely on those things unseen within the two of them, those things that could only be experienced through knowing his personal meanings behind the words he chose to use with her over the phone, the messages the conveyed with his eyes alone when he stood across the room from her, the penetrating and palpable emotions he transmitted to her simply by sitting next to her without actually touching her.

He didn’t need to touch her to touch her. She didn’t need to touch him to touch him. They had evolved beyond that.

This didn’t mean they didn’t lie within another’s arms when he came home. Because they often did, sometimes in the clothes they’d been wearing that day, sometimes dressed down to only meager cotton and satin layers resting between their heated flesh. But they didn’t _need_ to in order to feel official or together. The raw, primal act of him thrusting his erection into her vagina wasn’t the only way they made love anymore.

He sought sanctuary in her body but more importantly he sought sanctuary in her mind, in her voice and in her words. And he never failed to find it because she was prepared and willing to offer it up whenever he came looking and even when he wasn’t. This was her position and her job as his de facto wife and she wouldn’t want any other responsibility. He was her top priority. He always had been.

And as he began looking toward the future more and more his grip on her continued to tighten. Though, sometimes this scared her because sometimes it felt he was looking to the future so much out of a nervous desire to _not_ be in the present which only made her worry about the true state of the war. Something he stubbornly insisted be kept from her.

But it had slipped through the grape vine that she would be the only one left after everything was said and done and this she believed.

He would live out and finish writing that part of his story. He would leave it behind because she knew how God damn tired he was of all of this and of all the people he was constantly arguing and arguing and  _arguing_ with. She didn’t need him to state with specific terms in their conversations over the phone or upon paper or in person what exactly was going on with him and those who were supposed to be carrying out his orders. She didn’t need him to tell her he was irritated and frustrated and disappointed and angry and simply unhappy when he was because she could feel it twisting and contorting her stomach when he greeted her and asked her what she’d been up to that day. She could hear as clear as an air raid siren the exhaustion he hid from those who were causing it because he refused to ever show weakness or vulnerability… she saw the exhaustion that was greying his hair and lining his face and had him regularly clenching his left hand in his right because it had started to tremble and he was trying his damnedest to _hide_ _that_.

But she’d noticed it. She’d seen it. She wanted to talk to him about it. Ask him what the fuck was going on to cause such an alarming symptom and had he seen a doctor about it? A specialist about it? Someone–anyone–other than Morell about it? Because she knew he hadn’t because that would mean it was real. She knew to him, it didn’t really exist as far as he was concerned. Not at this point. He expected her to pretend that a very large problem was in reality not a problem at all, it was only matter of stress regarding the war and his generals and ignorant people not listening to him.

She didn’t blame him for being stressed, she didn’t. No one would. But she wanted to know exactly what was going on this time because when it came to the serious shit he never told her anything because he didn’t want her to worry about anything, much less him. He thought it was cute, admirable, sweet but quite unnecessary, he’d said. He was fine.

Fine fine fine just fine. Extremely fine, really.

Just. A little. Tired.

It was always just _a little tired._

All she had to worry about was herself, that’s what was best for him anyway; and if she really needed someone else to worry about she should worry about those who were dying for Germany at the Fronts. He didn’t consider himself among the brave soldiers who were falling to bloodshed but she did. And she worried about him just the same.

Every morning she awoke to an empty bed after he’d decided he’d had enough time off she saw it as her future: an eternally empty bed. He wasn’t going to come home this time. He was going to die. Could he at least wait until she could die with him, by his side? Or was that selfish, to want him to wait? She just didn’t want that eternally empty bed. That wasn’t the life she had signed up for and that wasn’t a life she would ever accept.

In the meantime, she had taken on the mission to remedy his ill feelings and his heavy weighted moods. Which was happening with increasing frequency much to her own great displeasure. She shouldn’t be seeing him in this state _this_ much. He was too young to be looking so old, and this caused her to smoke twice as many cigarettes and occasionally bite at her own nails even though she chastised him for that habit. But he’d always looked a bit younger than he really was.

At least, that’s what she’d always thought.

They still had so much left to write concerning this half of the story. The half that concerned her and him and everything they had physically and figuratively built and everything they now secretly stood for. She knew this and she knew he knew this but it couldn’t be done until everything else was said and done. The dust on the battlefield had to be settled before they could settle down; but this did not settle well with her because she could see how unsettled all this business had made him.

It was killing her because it was killing him, this she was absolutely certain of.  He could still defeat anyone in a battle of wits and he need not to look at a set of numbers more than once to know them by heart and he was still able to quote his favorite books and tell anyone the exact page number of said quote. He still maintained all of his mental superpowers, he was still the incredible man he’d always been but it worried her how he now preferred to talk in circles because he had become far too insistent on avoiding all other subjects.

He simply wasn’t going to give up until the other side had fallen. Even if it killed him.

And what would she do then?

Die.

She didn’t want that to be where their story ended but it couldn’t be helped. The story couldn’t go on without him anyway so what would be the point?

She often wished he had taken lessons from the mistakes of Napoleon whose story he knew so well. She often wondered where they’d be had he waited to attack Stalin. Couldn’t he have left that messy job to his successor?

But no. This was something that was to never be discussed with him. She never brought it up with him—or anyone—and honestly what good would that do, the past could not be changed. They were fleeting thoughts. Fleeting thoughts that continued to knock at her skull demanding entrance. Giving her headaches.

But the other side to his story that was contained within the hundreds of letters between the two of them she was keeping for… she wasn’t sure yet. For now, they were strictly used for her own sanity, strictly seen by their eyes and only their eyes. But were they for posterity? She didn’t know.

It would depend on the outcome of this war.

And that was the problem. A problem she wasn’t sure he saw.

What if… he lost?

The thought made her dizzy and her hands shake and her lungs feel as though they were collapsing right within her chest. But it felt like it was becoming more and more of a possibility each day; and every single day she pushed herself further into denial. That wasn’t going to happen because he was a genius and he knew what he was doing and if _only people would start listening to him for goodness’ sake…._

But what if they didn’t?

What if they threw his victory away?

Yes. That was the question that actually must be asked. What if they damned him to ruin, to death?

He’d only been reclaiming Danzig in the name of the Germans but she knew the world wouldn’t see it that way, wouldn’t make it out that way. History would hurl him into the fire of guilt and stamp him with the mark of Instigator. It would be the Great War all over again only she knew it would be so much worse. And this was where the problem was going to lie.

His mania for secrecy wasn’t going to help him there. Where was the other half of his story going to wind up? If he had his way most likely as a useless pile of ashes in a smoldering hole somewhere. But if the outcome was defeat that would only harm him in the end.

Death wasn’t what she feared the most. It was the thought of him personally tearing out of his own book the most decisive pages when she knew the world would need his entire story; when she knew the pages he was ripping out were the ones that held his humanity.


	6. The Letter [T]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some last words from a lonely forgotten lover. (Rated: T)

_Geliebter,_

_I’m unsure of what to do anymore. I’m unsure of myself. Who am I now? The question turns in my head like a carousel and it’s going so fast I can’t seem to get off. It’s endless, this misery; this uncertainty; this waiting._

_What is this that we have here, between you and me? Is there anything at all? I’m no longer sure anymore._

_I’m unsure of you, now, too. Sometimes I feel as though you do things on purpose simply to keep me in the dark, to keep me on my toes. I’m always sitting on the fence with you, wondering onto which side I will fall this time._

_I’ll admit it was interesting at first. It drew me in further. I took it as a challenge and as a facet of a relationship with someone so much more mature than me. But I have grown tired of this game after so many years. It’d be easier to continue on playing if I knew for certain there was an obtainable victory in the future._

_However, as of right now, I see none. I can only see myself repeating the same moves over and over again, and you yourself doing the same._

_If you have outgrown me, I will understand. You must realize I would never stand in the way of your happiness. I would do everything in my power to give it to you, including forfeiting the position of being your friend and your lover._

_I say friend as well because I know it would be too hard for me to remain in personal contact with you knowing our history and knowing I will no longer be living in those wonderful moments we have shared. I mean it as no insult to you, no passive-aggressive act to express that I am bitter about your decision. Don’t think for a second I would resent you if you choose a life without me. How could I ever harbor such evil feelings towards you? Impossible._

_But I know it would hurt too much, especially the day I would eventually see you walking with another girl on your arm, being forced to confront that you were sharing those same moments you had once shared with me with **her**._

_I can’t promise I won’t resent her. I know it’s silly but I think it’s only natural and inevitable. I’m only human, after all. How can one not hate the partner of the one whom one loves so deeply, so fervently? In a way it will feel as though she has taken you from me; and even though I know that would not be the case, emotions are uncontrollable. They will come as they will, no matter the lack of rational behind them._

_Do you remember that weekend in June, when Heinrich had taken his family up to Berlin for a whole five days; and I had told my parents I was spending the weekend with Herta?_

_It was so hot and their air conditioning was broken and there wasn’t even a breeze to blow through the windows. You showed up that Friday night, even though your cool apartment would have been much more comfortable. But there had been some reason it had been impossible for you to take me there–you never shared it with me–and you had chosen that time to follow through on your promise of spending those three days with me, even if it meant we would be wet and sticky for the most part._

_We ripped the blankets off the bed that night, remember? We opened the windows in vain, hoping it might cool the rooms even marginally. Honestly, now that I think about it, it probably only made it worse once the morning came!_

_And even though it was so, so hot–even through the night–you still held me close and stroked my hair until I had fallen asleep. And every morning I still found you lying beside me. You were a bit of a bed hog that weekend but I sincerely didn’t mind. You were willing to stay with me through the night so I was willing to give you as much space as you needed so you could cool off as much as possible._

_We spent one whole afternoon that weekend simply lying on the wood floor because it felt cooler against our skin than the thick fabric of the couches and especially those God awful heat trapping sheets. We snacked on ice cubes with our cold sandwiches and continued to rewet washcloths in cold water from the sink to place onto our foreheads. Our clothes were soaked by the time the night arrived. Do you remember how quickly we undressed?_

_You held my hand all that afternoon. That’s the sensation I remember most. We laid there and we talked about so many things and through every hour you kept your fingers locked with mine. It felt so nice and so secure. I hadn’t ever felt more certain of what we had together than I did that day._

_It was something so simple. And it meant the world to me._

_But what I remember most vividly was that Saturday night. Now especially it’s more of a dream to me than reality. I can remember every little detail, though._

_We had such a magical night even though we were both incredibly sweaty and everything we did only made that room more humid. That we weren’t wearing clothes helped us none. We threw that away in favor of doing something better even though every minute only made us hotter._

_Then you said you loved me. You told me you were madly in love with me._

_Do you remember how confused and a little worried you were when I started crying? It happened before I even realized it. I just couldn’t believe it. I’m sure you remember how I asked you to say it again and you laughed at my womanish desires and said it again, just because I asked. Every single time I asked that night you said it. Over and over._

_You kissed my eyelids and told me you hadn’t felt so happy in years; and I told you I hadn’t felt so happy in all my life._

_I’ve held onto that moment through everything. The days I’d heard you’d come back to the city and didn’t hear a word from you or see your face for even a moment; the days you promised you’d see me and without any explanation or reason, without any forewarning, you simply never showed; the days I spent hours by your side and you hardly even glanced my way; the days I felt invisible to you, like I was just another meaningless civilian. Like I didn’t even exist to your eyes._

_I held onto that moment. I told myself that wasn’t our reality; that weekend, who we were that weekend was who we really were. **That** was our reality. **That** was us._

_My grip has failed and I can no longer hold onto that moment. You haven’t spoken to me in three months–has it been longer? I don’t know anymore, so much time has slipped away that even the blue of your eyes is dull in my memory–and I can’t help but feel you have dropped me once and for all._

_I would greatly appreciate some official statement from you. At the very least, I beg you to give me that. If what we have is nothing anymore, please just tell me. I can’t bear this._

_If you no longer love me, please just say it. I promise I can take it. At least until I am out of sight._

_There are no more options left for me._

_What am I to do._

_Yours, Eva_

The pen stops and she looks over what she has released onto the page before her with tortured eyes. She knows it is much too revealing. She knows she will never send it, that no other eyes will ever see it.

She tears the pages into strips and tosses them into the fire. She watches on as they buckle and twist beneath the heat, as the flames try to erase her pain.

But it’s impossible. It has simply taken on a different form.

The fire is now gone. All that remains is a sad pile of grey ashes.


	7. The Birthday Card [K]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You can’t eat your cake and make it too. (Rated: T)

“Hey!” She slapped at the back of his hand. “Get your fingers outta here!”

“Why?” he said, raising his fingers to his mouth to lick the cake batter off.

“Because it’s rude _,_ ” she said as she went back to stirring the thick dark mixture. “And unsanitary.” They were alone in the back kitchen that was used specifically for the preparation of his meals and his meals alone.

“But it’s _my_ cake, isn’t it?”

“I don’t see your point.”

“Well, seeing as how _I’ll_ be the one eating it,” he said as he promptly stole more of the batter, “I really don’t mind if I sample it beforehand.”

She turned her intense gaze on him as he licked his fingers again, looking at her with all the innocence of a harmless child. “Get out of my kitchen,” she said and weakly pushed him away from her.

“ _Your_ kitchen!” he exclaimed in mock surprise. “How silly of me! I was under the impression this was my house,” he said as he looked around the room dramatically as if he were confused.

“You may have paid for the materials but you can’t cook worth your salt.”

“You don’t know that. I’ve never tried.”

“And I suppose you’re going to start now?” she inquired, facing him as she moved her hands to her hips and tilted her head.

“Don’t be foolish. There are far more important things for me to be doing than wasting time learning a skill better suited to a woman.”

“Like getting out of my kitchen?” she offered with a smile.

“You’re being a poor sport,” he said. He glanced over at the temporarily forgotten bowl and swiftly dipped his fingers in again. “Here,” he said and tapped her on the nose, marking her with batter.

“Adi!” she whined. “You’re going to waste it,” she said as she turned around in search of a towel.

“I’m not wasting anything,” he said genially as he took his opportunity to swipe more. “It’s all going to the same place.”

She turned back to him as she wiped her nose clean, her shoulders falling in defeat as she observed him. She sighed softly and wet the towel in the sink, walking back to him. “You have chocolate in your mustache,” she said fondly, affectionately removing the chocolate from his face.

“You look tired,” he said after a moment.

“Not all of us have the pleasure of sleeping until noon, my love,” she said as she put the towel away and went back to stirring the batter.

“Perhaps you should take a nap,” he suggested.

“Oh no,” she said, shaking her head. She could see in her mind’s eye the lengthy list of things she still needed to get around to. “There’s still far too much left for me to do today. I have to finish up this cake and then move onto wr–”

He placed his hand over hers, halting her stirring motion. “Perhaps you should take a nap,” he repeated more emphatically.

She gazed up at him, startled. “Really, Adi, I’m–”

_Oooh._

She giggled, feeling rather featherbrained, and suppressed the urge to smack herself on the forehead. “I don’t know,” she shrugged, “I really do have so much to do.”

“They couldn’t possibly be more important than your health.”

“Oh, _my_ health,” she nodded dramatically, grinning. “Well, that’s very thoughtful of you: thinking of my well-being.”

Though, he really did concern himself with her state of health an awful lot. Often to the extent that it grated on her nerves. He never wanted her doing anything too risky–a.k.a. fun–but what else was she to do up here while she waited for him to come home?

“Let me ask you this,” he started, abruptly switching topics. “For whom are you doing all these things on this list?”

“Well, you,” she answered simply.

“That’s what I thought,” he said and with gentle force removed her hand from the spoon she’d been gripping.

“Hey–wait!” she protested as he quickly lead her out of the kitchen, pulling her along behind him by the wrist. “You’re not gonna be happy when–”

He made a sharp right and as soon as they’d cleared the corner that opened to a narrow, heavily shadowed hallway, he unexpectedly pulled her in close to him. “Just think of it as another thing on the list,” he said.

It suddenly occurred to her, as she stood out in the open, unguarded hallway pressed up against him, that she hadn’t talked to or seen anyone around in the last two hours. Where was everybody? Clearly not wandering to this part of the house any time soon.

But to anyone else they would’ve simply been two ambiguous silhouettes against a background of blue light that was falling in through a large window at the far end of the hall. She was aware he knew something-whatever it was had given him the confidence needed to act so brazenly with her without fearing unwanted eyes; but she couldn’t bring herself to care about what it might be.

She reached up on her toes, gripped him by his collar and kissed him softly. Despite that awareness, she still felt a bit of a rush at the prospect of them being caught. “That list is a list of chores,” she said quietly, “among which loving you is never a part of. I actually enjoy _that_.”

“Good. I was fretting you might force me to play the But-It’s-My-Birthday card so early in the game.”

“What do you plan on using it for?”

“I’m not sure yet. Whatever I do that’ll make you mad-and I _know_ that’ll happen.”

“Oh, Adi, you never–”

“Don’t even say it,” he said, putting a finger to her lips.

She looked a bit guilty. “I only get mad because you drive me crazy, you know.”

He smiled dotingly down at her. “I know,” he said. “Perhaps you can use that to sympathize with me when the thought of you breaking your leg skiing drives _me_ crazy.”

“Now that’s completely different!” she challenged.

“How so?”

“Skiing _is_ good for my health; you agonizing over every little thing that could possibly go wrong, that’s not good. For you, I mean.”

“What’s wrong with walking? Walking is healthy, too; and safe.”

“I could be attacked by a bear,” she said with artificial seriousness, leaning into him. “What will I do then? I can out-ski a bear but I can’t out-run him.”

“You’re right,” he agreed, nodding soberly. “You should just remain indoors at all times.”

“You’re killing me,” she said flatly.

“And you’re patronizing me,” he countered. “ _On my birthday.”_

She smirked, gazing at him thoughtfully, and shrugged. “Fine, if that’s really what you want to use that card for,” she said in an airy voice and began to walk in the direction of the staircase. “Consider it used.”

“Now wait a second, that’s unfair,” he said, trailing up the stairs close behind her.

“Oh? So you don’t want to use it now? All right then,” she allowed as she stepped into her bedroom. She fell back onto her bed and sat up on her elbows, looking at him in mischief. “But you do realize that means I get to ski, yes?”

“No, I don’t think it does, actually,” he said, closing the door behind him.

She cocked her head and looked to the ceiling, her countenance that of exaggerated thoughtfulness. “I think it does. See, the way I see it–”

Then his mouth was on hers, silencing her, his body immobilizing her beneath him against the mattress. “Let’s not talk about this,” he said, tenderly pushing her hair back from her face. “It’s boring.”

He resumed kissing her.


	8. Moving On [T]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A spat between sisters over one’s lover. (Rated: T)

_Post 1932 — Pre 1935_

“He doesn’t like me reading the newspapers.”

“Yes, and this is why.” Ilse thrust the article back at her.

“I don’t know what you expect me to do about it,” she said hurriedly, sharply waving her sister off with one of her hands, the other going up to her damp forehead. She paced across the room, stopping in front of the window and drawing the curtain back a bit, peeking out. The light fell onto her face in a harsh gold line, darting across one eye like a fiery scar. She focused on a biker speeding past the front of the apartment.

“I expect you to not get _involved_ ,” her sister clarified in a hard voice. “Or, rather any more than you already have.” She shot Ilse a rigid look, her lips pressing together tight. The fabric of the curtain beneath her fingers deformed beneath the tension in her hand. “Eva, he’s bad-”

“You have no right,” she whispered icily, jerking the curtain closed again. The room reverted back to its humid dimness. “You don’t know him like I do.”

“ _Do_ you, though?” Ilse demanded. “ _Whom_ is it you know? How can you truly know whom he is and is not?”

“I can tell you I know him better than a piece of paper, that’s for sure,” Eva snapped, reaching out and tearing the article out of her sister’s hand. “I’m certainly more credible than an outside journalist who’s _paid_ to write these kinds of things, you know,” she went on, holding up the paper and snapping it with the backs of her fingers.

“You’re playing with fire,” her sister warned delicately.

“And you’re out of line.” She calmly ripped the paper into several pieces and proceeded to toss them neatly into the waste bin. Her sister watched on with horrified confusion and frustration, her eyes bouncing back and forth from the destroyed article and her sister’s indiscernible face. “I think it’s best you go now, Ilse,” she said in a low, hard voice.

“You understand what’s going to happen, don’t you? What he’s going to do?” Ilse asked, the words slipping from between her lips like frost. She noticed the slight tightening in her sister’s eyes, the momentary unease that was rapidly suffocated by denial.

The sickeningly firm hold this man had obtained over her sister made her heart heavy with despair and turned her stomach over with fear. What was happening in their beloved homeland was reflected in this tiny, individual girl. People were turning into sheep all around her faster than she could comprehend; and she knew they would all blindingly follow this seductively angry man to their violent and bloody slaughter on a scale unseen in the modern world before.

But that didn’t frighten her nearly as much as the realization that her sister would doubtlessly be at the front of the herd unless she pulled her out from beneath his spell.

“What do _you_ know?” Eva shot back. Ilse opened her mouth to speak but she cut her off. “That was rhetorical. You know nothing. How could you? How could you know _anything_ of what’s really going on?”

“Eva _—_ ” Ilse began to plead but she made a decisive motion with her hand and cut her off.

“Enough. Please leave, now.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” her sister stated stiffly.

She titled her chin up an inch, her eyes narrowed in determination. She had never grown out of the stubbornness that had marked her during their childhood. “Fine. It matters not. I’m leaving soon, anyway.”

With disapproval pulling at her eyebrows, Ilse asked “With him?”

“ _Yes_ ,” she all but hissed. Eva was now void of any remaining patience regarding this subject. Her saint of a sister had never liked her boyfriend. She had been endlessly criticizing him and everything he either did or did not do from the moment she had discovered their relationship. Nothing was ever considered “good enough” for Ilse when it came to her Adolf. “With him, Ilse. With my boyfriend.”

“He’s hardly worthy of the term,” Ilse remarked with abundant disdain, crossing her arms over her chest. “All he wants from you is sex. You make him feel young. That’s about it.”

“I find it comical you feel you’re entitled to make such comments when you’ve never even met him,” she scoffed, masking the hot prick she had felt flare within her chest. She wasn’t going to let Ilse know there was still a small part of her that dreaded there might be truth in her statement, the possibility of such an outcome.

“I don’t need to in order to know what kind of a person he is and what he’s after. Come on, Eva. I know you’re not this dense.”

“And I had never thought you were this insensitive. But I suppose everything changes over time,” she responded. “I don’t care if you believe I’m stupid for loving him.”

“It’s not lo _—_ ”

“Shut the _fuck_ up, Ilse.” Her sister’s eyes widened and she leaned back a bit. She noticed the time and hastily began preparing for her departure. “Do us all a favor and keep to analyzing your own life from now on. I never asked for your opinion because I don’t need it. It’s worthless to me.” A shadow flew over the walls of Herr Hoffmann’s living room and Eva was suddenly on her way to the door, her footsteps hard against the wood. “ _You’re_ worthless to me.”

“Eva, please wait!” Ilse begged as she reached out and grabbed her sister at the elbow, jerking her a halt.

“I have nothing more to say to you!” Eva stressed, fuming. “And I’m not interested in anything more you have to say.”

“Eva, listen: once you give in, that’s it,” Ilse said in a hushed and hurried voice. “You’ll have nothing more to offer him. He’ll enjoy it for a while but then he’ll get bored… and then he’ll drop you. He’ll move onto the next girl who turns his head, that’s just what they do. He’s no different from the rest of them.”

Eva was silent for a moment, her eyes closed as she thought about what to say next.

She gave a long sigh. “I must admit, this has been the most inaccurate assumption you’ve drawn all night,” she said as she swung the door open and stepped out into the warm, orange evening light. Then she stopped and turned to look back at her sister, her expression soft and reassuring. “You really needn’t worry about that. He hasn’t moved onto the next girl.”

Ilse only stared at her.

And then her shoulders visibly fell and she gently shook her head. “Oh no, Eva. Tell me you didn’t.”

“But can’t you see? _I’m_ the last girl for him. He’s not going to move onto another because he’s going to marry me.”

Her sister’s eyebrows scrunched together again. “Wait a minute. Has he proposed to you?”

Eva only smiled. “I have an opera to get to and I’ve kept him waiting far too long. Try to have a nice evening, Ilse. I know I will,” she said and turned away from her again, running out into the twilight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here’s a tiff between Ilse and Eva regarding her beau. This is how I imagine young Ilse might have felt toward her younger sister’s seducer at this point in their lives.


	9. Superstition Syndrome [K]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A New Year's ritual predicts a gloomy future. (Rated: K)

It was strange that the shower was already running. He’d entered the bathroom only a few minutes ago and the water was already running. He’d gone in wearing a full three piece suit. He didn’t turn the tap on in advance. Not when he was wearing a three piece suit. There were too many layers to be discarded first.

She gingerly stepped up to the door and pressed her ear against the smooth wood. She could only hear water falling onto the tile, violently making contact with the floor. Too violent; too weighty. She softly rapped on the door with her knuckles and said in a curious voice “Adi?”

No response came, so she turned the metal knob and gently pushed open the door. She was greeted with a familiar cloud of steam and heat, and she made her way forward before rounding the corner to access the shower.

He stood before her fully clothed, beneath the steady spray of water. He had one hand up against the wall of the shower, leaning against it with his head down. Drops of water were rolling off the tips of his hair and plunging down to the floor. Small streams were traveling down the back of his neck and snaking their way into his clothing. His suit clung heavily to his bent over figure.

As she neared him, she could see his eyes were closed and his lips were moving fast, whispering something she could not hear.

She continued to move toward him, taking delicate steps. The nylons covering her feet instantly drank up the water as she stepped into the shower beside him. She reached out and put a comforting hand on his fabric laden arm, saying again “Adi?”

His eyes opened and he jerked his head to look over at her, drops flinging themselves off the locks of his hair and colliding with her face. His eyes were wide, the tiny pupils rapidly darting back and forth as he desperately attempted to make sense of what was buzzing crazily within his mind. She stepped into him and assuredly moved her hands to his face. She saw his body go rigid and out of the corner of her eye noticed his fingers on the wall curl in tension.

“Adi, what’s wrong?” she said, steady. She held onto his gaze.

“Something’s about to go wrong,” he murmured hoarsely, his words flying. “Something is about to go very wrong, very wrong.”

“What will go wrong?”

“Something will go wrong.”

“What?”

“It cannot go wrong,“ he continued, unaware of her words. “I cannot be wrong, I will not be wrong, I am _not_ wrong.”

“You’re not making sense.”

“I’m not wrong,” he whispered.

“You’re not wrong, sweetheart. I know,” she assured him, stroking his face.

“I will win.”

She realized what was happening. “You will win,” she nodded. “Don’t let some silly superstition tell you otherwise.”

The outcome of the ritual had been festering within his mind all night. This is what became of her love when he was left to explore his own worries for too long. He had been silently nurturing them. She shouldn’t have allowed him to sit alone in front of the fireplace for the rest of the party.

“I will win.”

“Yes.”

“I have to win.”

“You _will_ win.”

Then he grabbed her face and pulled her to him, kissing her so fiercely their teeth met. His lips were rough and panicked, and his fingers too stiff to put her at ease. His fear, his doubt, was spilling into her and it was stirring up her own confidence. She didn’t like this. He was scaring her. He was standing before her, touching her, kissing her; and she was terrified because it felt like he was slipping away. It felt like he was saying goodbye.

She wasn’t sure if she was crying. He had tilted her head up towards the water and she wasn’t sure if it was tears or only the shower stream that was descending down her cheeks. Her knees began to go numb and she stumbled. He responded by securely wrapping one arm around her body, holding her up against him. His other hand moved into her tangled hair and hers did the same. She gripped onto his fixed locks and she knew she was probably pulling painfully at his scalp but he gave it no regard.

“Adi, what’s happening?” she gasped when he buried his face into her neck. Her heart was beating hard, jumping around in her rib cage like a wild bull.

“I have to win,” he repeated deep into her skin. She could feel the subtle vibration within his chest as he spoke. “I have to win.”

She opened her mouth to respond but he quickly continued on after a beat.

“I cannot lose—I _cannot_ lose.”

“Adi!” she cried.

“ _I cannot lose._ ”

And the statement was caught in the air. They were breathing heavily, their chests inflating then deflating in synchronization. Their grips had not faltered, remaining solid in their hold on one another. They stood unmoving together, the water passively running down their clothed bodies and pooling at their feet before disappearing into the drain like the rest of the world.

The word had gone unsaid but neither of their ears required a voice to detect, recognize, and acknowledge it. It was there and they both knew it.

This was how he communicated his love to her.

She hugged him as tight to her as her strong arms, toned from years of rigorous athletics, would allow. She heard him make a low sound that suggested she was holding him too tight and she knew not to let up. She maintained her hold.

This was how she communicated she understood.

Into his ear she whispered “I can’t lose you either.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had this idea. So I wrote it.


End file.
